How good is Merhts?! Mostly pretty funny, happy to have a dig at himself and a reasonably astute observer of the game. I love how he puts forward a reasonable argument and then laughs at himself when he ended up being completely wrong!

“The affable, mature, modest Quade Cooper was the reason the Wallabies won.” You answer your own question Harry. None of these adjectives could have been applied to Cooper in the past. Much like James O’Connor, Cooper seems to have really benefitted from being given the cold shoulder and having to go and make his way in other places, look internally at why he might struggle with other personalities rather than just externally.

Thanks for the wrap as always Geoff.

Amazing contrasting games. The first game had the more entertaining rugby, but the second was a better spectacle!

It looks to me like RSA need to consider how they can very their game plan. Right now their approach reduces the amount of tackling their opposition has to do and the Wallabies looked VERY fresh in the last 20 mins. Fitness aside they had plenty of breaks and a lot of time let off through the kicking game.

Never been a Quade fan but the way he played last night was exceptional. None of the issues I have seen in his game, from attitude to execution, were a problem. He’s come a long way from getting angry at his team mates when he threw a bullet pass straight to the touchline, or sidestepping out from his duty of tackling a hard running Ma’a Nonu.

The Aus/RSA result really livens up the competition though one now worries how dominant the All Blacks might actually be. Aside from an excellent first half defensive effort Argentina seemed to hold little challenge for the darkness even with a big, passionate pack. The All Blacks might not be the most physical team in the world, but that doesn’t mean they haven’t got the menace to muscle up where it counts.

I thought the boks were binding well before the player reached the ground which I believe to also be illegal.

Funnily enough it was the Crusaders sides of the early 2000’s that gave rise to the Cantablacks of that era. A great example of a picking on provincial success and see international results waiver. The more recent selections from Crusaders sides have been based on individual performance within what is a VERY good team, rather than relying on existing combinations.

I have refrained from commenting on these articles before and I think I’ll return to that poisition but generally:

I find these articles recutting freely available commentary form other websites to be extremely low value. At their best they provide a limited view of other author’s content, at their worst they appear to be cut to be specifically inflammatory to an Australian audience.

I think The Roar can do better than this type of article.

I see where you are coming from but you might want to go have a look at those numbers. Of the “in” players in your linked page above well over half of them are current super rugby level players or better, cswitching teams, coming back from injury or from overseas. By my count around 20 are young provincial players entering straight from provincial level.

And crucially, there needs to be some replacement rate, as NZ also loses players to retirement, to other countries or they aren’t good enough. These young guys coming in a replacing someone most of the time after all. So by your measure there are ANOTHER 40 odd players beyond this list who could be playing super rugby? That seems very optimistic….

That Potsie is an example of extremely short sighted and foolish contracting on behalf of Australian Super Rugby teams. An unfortunate consequence, I feel, of the Australia game being awash at every level with lawyers….

Lr6050, this isn’t even a suggestion, it’s already happening! My main focus was to highlight to the rugby community that quite frankly there is no genuine barrier to AU super sides contracting kiwi players beyond offering them a contract worth taking.

I agree with you some of the recent moonshot ideas have been a little short on logic….

The lack of cohesive direction across the rugby landscape in Australia is indeed a problem LBJ. I suspect for example that the Clubs would be less than happy if their star players were missing out on Super contracts and wallabies pathways because they are blocked by a Kiwi. (although they may actually prefer that situation so they can keep their best players, short sighted selfish action being a hallmark of the Australian Club scene…)

It’s funny though how these disagreements tend to fall away when things are going well. The wallabies start wining, which means more money which means the clubs start getting invited to the table with some cash and the super sides are happy because people are interested in rugby and coming to their games and so on. It’s only when things are bad that the obvious cracks and self interest start appearing.

NZR only have a limited amount of control over players not contracted to Super Rugby sides. The Provincial Contract, the terms of which can be found online, has a very weak restriction on allowing provincially contracted players to play rugby for other teams and NZR has no way of stopping a provincial team from signing a All Blacks eligible player who is playing their Super Rugby in Australia. So as it stands, right now there is basically no firm contracting situation stopping kiwi players from playing in Australian Super rugby teams and then joining their provincial teams for NPC.

I’d argue NZ does not produce quite so many super calibre players. I reckon there is maybe 15 to 20 who could cut it at super level week in week out, with some fairly solid variability across positions. Heaps of opensides and wings, not many locks. Enough to help plug some of the gaps in Australia but not even close to enough to flood the Australian teams.

And the underperformance of the Kiwi duo at the Waratahs.

An interesting phenomenon that is highlight I think by the number of NZ locks playing in Australia is how both countries seem to have a BIG gap between best and worst in that position and I don’t think that the fringe Kiwi locks are really much different to the players they might usurp in Australia.

Basically I think the sheer genetic restriction on the body type required for the position is a greater limiting factor than playing depth, especially in the lower population New Zealand.

Cheers Wal!

There’s a whole ‘nother angle of looking at getting older players with a couple of decent years left into those teams but the mechanics of that are somewhat different, and again nothing is standing on the way of the already beyond will and maybe dollars.

Important to note of the players you mention 4 of them are internationals for Pacific Island nations which causes headaches for NZ Super Rugby teams as they have a limit on non-NZ eligible players, so they like to keep those slots for high-impact players in positions they are struggling for depth.

TWiU, there’s a whole world of marquee players Australia could be targeting to achieve what you highlight, but its always going to come down to dollars, an area of weakness for Rugby in Australia.

Thanks Jez.

Look I agree that having a world-class player in Rettalick could be massively beneficial for the younger players around him but it raises other issues I didn’t want to get into. World Class players are EXPENSIVE and Australian Rugby cannot afford that right now. Further they lock down their positions so you will definitely be limiting starting opportunities for Australia players. Basically what I describe aims to import NZ standards without importing costs or limiting too many opportunities for Australian players.

Also, to use Thrush and Kahui as examples, it’s well worth looking at older, slightly over the hill players as well. They bring heaps of knowledge and experience and again don’t necessarily command a starting position.

Honestly the Rettalick v Tucker at the Waratahs was more trying to give an example off the top of my head rather than thinking about the specific needs of the team AND I didn’t realise at time of writing that Tucker was playing in Canberra!

Now that you mention it though:

Jack Whetton is a VERY different kettle of fish Jez. He’s 29, has 9 years of professional rugby behind him without a standout season or the ability to hold down a starting spot outside of third tier team in England. Basically he was a flat out bad scout because all evidence, of which there is a decent amount, suggests he is not up to standard as a professional rugby player. Good bloke though.

Sam Caird is a better example and I thought he performed significantly better than Whetton across the season. A guy who can start, sets a standard but isn’t going to command a place if a decent Australian player comes through the ranks.

I hadn’t picked that up funnily enough Brett, I’d noticed him playing for the Waikato. Still a good example though!

Careful Ferret. There are definitely plenty of Pasifika players in the Wallabies and through Australia super rugby sides but the vast majority are born in Australia or are born in New Zealand and moved to Australia in their youth. For example of the Pasifika players in the Bledisloe 2 squad:

BPA: Born in New Zealand, moved to Australia as a teenager.
Allan Ala’alatoa: Born in Sydney
Rob Valetini: Born in Melbourne
Noah Lolesio: Born in New Zealand, moved to Australia as a teenager.
Marika Koroibete: Born in Fiji, moved to Australia at 19 to play Rugby League
Mat To’omua: Born in Melbourne
Hunter Paisami: Born in Samoa, spent most of his childhood in New Zealand before moving to Australia as a teenager.
Len Ikitau: Born in New Zealand, moved to Australia aged 12.

So out of 8 Pasifika players 3 are born in Australia, 3 are born in New Zealand but moved to Australia when they were young and only 2 were born in the pacific islands, with one of those still attending high school in Australia.

Money runs the WHOLE system now Sheek. It’s sad but it’s the truth. Everything from insurance at juniors and subbies level to young kids seeing the best players in gold requires money that is generated through the professional game.

We can bemoan the loss of amateurism all we want, that horse bolted a quarter century ago.

I don’t think it will be a panacea Dean, and it might in fact be proven to be a waste of time. But something has to be done about how thin the professional playing stocks are in Australia right now, if you want to have 5 super rugby teams.

I agree Thrush and Kahui are bad examples, though it goes to show that there is no barrier to kiwis playing in Australia.

JGB has managed to get a contract at the hurricanes and Hawera is now playing at Kubota Spears, both pretty decent teams and I see young James Tucker has been gobbled up the Brumbies in what I think is a very astute pick up. There have definitely been more than a few false starts but I think that is more to do with failures of scouting. Jack Whetton got in because of his name, Sam Caird never kicked on from his NZ u20s appearance. No amount of extra players to choose from is going to improve the quality of the Waratahs scouts it seems….

I would probably argue that at the super level Aussie coaching is fine. Brad Thorn came out of the new Zealand system and was a similar vintage to guys in New Zealand like Aaron Mauger and Leon McDonald. Dan Mckeller was head hunted by Dave Rennie who is a kiwi coach. Darryl Gibson was well thought of when he left the crusaders and didn’t appear to do a great job in Aus.

The problem, to my mind, is that the internal competition for places in teams is not signficant enough, which keeps a lid on players development. They only have to be better than the guy immediately behind them and in Australia that can be a big drop in talent.

For fringe Super rugby players in New Zealand the financial opportunity should be greater and they will have the opportunity to compete against the best in New Zealand more regularly. It also gives late bloomers another crack.

If people on Australia want All Blacks playing for Aussie sides then they don’t understand the market. Australia struggles to pay what it needs to to keep their players, where are they going to get the money to pay All Blacks who can command even larger sums in other places, and tend to be earning decent cash in NZ.

The question about quality is already being asked. See Kieran Reads comments and the utter lack of refutation from Aussie fans.

As it stands Australia can not fill 3 competitive Super rugby team, but they cannot afford the internal political fall out of culling any teams (see what happened to the force). Filling out Aussie teams with imports, and hopefully increasing the standards, is really the only viable path as it stands.

The main benefit for NZ Coker will be offering opportunities to late bloomers. The current pathway is heavily tilted towards young prospects and if a guy hasn’t made a Super rugby wider squad by 22 then the chances of him securing a spot later drop spectacularly. This is largely a function of both signficant contract competition and a restricted marketplace.

Some players just take a wee bit longer to develop and having them playing against top tier talent regularly, or just getting out of their comfort zone away from family could really jump start someone’s career.

Forgive a man his catchy article title Steve.